


The Angel Who Sauntered

by qwanderer



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Crowley's Fall (Good Omens), Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-23
Updated: 2020-02-23
Packaged: 2021-02-28 07:00:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 565
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22869754
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/qwanderer/pseuds/qwanderer
Summary: Crowley didn’t want to be in charge of the universe. He just wanted to have a bit of a say, sometimes, in how it was run.
Comments: 7
Kudos: 37





	The Angel Who Sauntered

**Author's Note:**

> I was just going to write some quick meta. It turned into a 200-word ficlet, then got eaten by the tunglr app. I tried to reproduce it and it tripled in size like a yeasty dough ball. wtf. I'll post it here I guess.

Crowley only ever asked questions.

Most angels didn’t. Lucifer did. Crowley didn’t particularly like Lucifer, didn’t particularly agree with the answers he came up with, but it was better than hanging around with people who didn’t seem to  _think_.

So Crowley hung around. 

Lucifer and the others had a place, a secret pocket full of shadows and whispers and murky in-betweens. They talked about what they would do differently, if they were in charge of the universe. Crowley asked questions, mainly. It was interesting, hearing the ways Lucifer could justify everything he said. Crowley added his two cents, from time to time, but asking questions got him more mileage. His opinions often just got him funny looks.

Crowley didn’t want to be in charge of the universe. He just wanted to have a bit of a say, sometimes, in how it was run.

Then, during one measureless event-before-time, the other angels came for them.

It was a raid that turned into a battle, as Lucifer’s contingent fought those who had come for them. A bloody battle, angel against angel. More terrible than anything that had ever been.

Crowley hid.

In the end, they were all captured, and brought before the other Archangels. Lucifer’s trial was first.

Lucifer was charming and articulate, when he so chose. He did not choose that, now. His arguments were loud and ugly, and it wasn’t hard to see why the Archangels chose to do what they did.

It took all their combined powers to do it. They cast Lucifer out, threw him down, out of Heaven and into the Nothingness beyond.

The others were brought before the Archangels one by one, and told to renounce Lucifer and disavow his heresy, or fall, as he had.

Some did as they were told, making excuses with wide, frightened eyes. Many more spat at the feet of the Archangels and fought tooth and nail against the angels charged with ejecting them from Heaven.

Crowley stood before them, and couldn’t bring himself to do either.

Instead, he asked for clarification on a few points.

“Are we talking about any heresies in particular, or does it need to be a… sort of… blanket disavowal?” he asked. “And could I get some time to think it over, sort some things out?”

Michael looked down their nose at him. “That’s not what we asked to hear,” was all the answer he got before they motioned to the angels standing guard.

Crowley flinched away. He wasn’t going to fight like the others. He didn’t want to hurt them. He didn’t particularly feel like fighting for a place in Heaven when Heaven hadn’t been that great to him in the first place and was now rejecting him outright.

He sidestepped their grabbing hands as they tried to throw him down. He didn’t especially want to join Lucifer, either. Didn’t want to know what ugly place would be created in the Nothingness by the uglier ideas Lucifer had had.

In the end, he slipped. 

_ I’m not going to use that word, _ he thinks, as the cosmic winds strip away his feathers.  _ It’s embarrassing. Doesn’t sound elegant.  _

He thinks about this to distract himself from the pain of the feathers tearing away, and from the thought of what will happen when he lands.

_ Sauntered, _ he thinks, clinging desperately to the idea that he’ll survive to tell the tale.  _ That sounds better. _


End file.
